Winning Business Digest Insight, tips and ideas on how to win more high value work
5
secrets of Influential
People By Steven Pearce
Are you paid the salary you deserve?
Are your contributions in meetings
given the attention they merit?
Are you ‘in the know’ in your firm,
part of the ‘inner circle’, a ‘mover
and a shaker’?
If the answer to any of these questions is no, then
you are probably suffering from an influence deficit.
The acquisition of influence is a
long-term process. It is the gradual
accumulation of credibility over
time, and it is a strategy far more
than a skill.
Influence is the magic dust that gets things done and gets you where
you want to go. Without it life can seem like the punishment of
Sisyphus - however much effort you put into rolling the boulder uphill,
you seem condemned to watch it roll back down to the bottom again.
I have been researching the subject of influence for my upcoming
book Secrets of Influential People, and spoke to dozens of people who
are influential in various spheres to find out just how they operate.
The result became 50 strategies to help increase your influence at
work. In this Winning Business Digest I’m sharing five of them to give
you a flavour.
This is one of The Results Consultancy’s Winning Business Digest series which gives practical tips
on a range of business development topics
WBD – May 2014 – Issue 23
2
Keep a foot in both camps
A recent New York Times article profiled Melvin Lim.
He occupies a hugely influential role in the worlds of
fashion and retail by ‘arranging a match between the
world’s most prestigious luxury brands and the world’s
fastest-growing consumer market’.
Lim is essentially a go-between, a hugely successful
entrepreneur who has made his fortune by helping
Western brands ease their way into the Chinese market,
and Chinese stars make it big in the West. He doesn’t
make or market anything himself. His skill is as a crosscultural facilitator, enabling commercial interaction
between two cultures by understanding both, and as a
result is big in both East and West.
The allure of the novel can be
overwhelming... but sometimes it pays to
offer a less sexy but better-balanced view.
1
Don’t follow fashion
Warren Buffet is one of the richest men in the world.
His fortune currently stands in excess of $50 billion.
Inevitably, a cottage industry has sprung up around
trying to divine the secrets of his success, to communicate
his investment wisdom to the masses. In fact, the man
himself expresses the key to his investment strategy pretty
succinctly: ‘We simply attempt to be fearful when others
are greedy and to be greedy only when others are fearful.’
That’s a contrarian approach in a nutshell. When the
rest of the investment world was drawn towards ever
more complex financial instruments in ever more
unlikely markets, Buffet was resolutely unfashionable.
He continued to invest in the unloved, the unpopular and
the undervalued. And he continued to build a fortune while
investors in derivatives (he memorably referred to these as
‘financial weapons of mass destruction’) were burned.
The allure of the novel can be overwhelming. We make
decisions based on what seems to be ‘cutting edge’ or the
‘next big thing’. Sometimes, it pays to offer a less sexy but
better-balanced view.
Influence-building tactic:
The next time you hear
the unmistakeable
sound of a bandwagon gathering speed, why not ask
everyone to pause and reflect? There are probably
other options worth considering – safer and less
alluring ones. It may be that you can’t stop the
bandwagon, but at least if it crashes you’ll be the one
to emerge with your reputation enhanced rather than
in tatters.
Winning Business Digest Insight, tips and ideas on how to win more high value work
Having a foot in both camps can be a very smart move,
even at a less rarefied level. So many organisations
operate in silos; the team on floor 4 doesn’t know what’s
going on up on floor 5. Marketing doesn’t speak to HR. It’s
not animus necessarily, just ignorance.
A CFO of an Asian-based multinational suggests another
way: ‘I have to be the arbiter between the boardroom
and operations. One of our business units may request
new investment, which the board might normally
dismiss. A stand-off could occur, so I need to explain the
operational considerations to the board and the strategic
imperatives to the business units. I am responsible for
that dialogue – views can be expressed through me that
would not be accepted if heard direct from the other side.’
Influence-building tactic:
So what if you
become the person
who acts as the bridge? Start a conversation across
offices, functions and divisions, for no other motive
than curiosity. The reward may be that you can start
to open up new channels of communication and
become the interlocutor of choice. You get to be
invited to both sets of meetings. If the two sides need
to collaborate, they will probably rely on you to get
it done. Be the conduit, the messenger, and become
influential to all sides not just your own.
3
Say it in metaphor
Sun Tzu wrote the Art of War in about 500 BC, but
it remains a favourite text for leaders everywhere.
Its popularity is surely due in part to our thirst for
metaphor and analogy (not many of the Chinese
general’s 21st century readers will be tasked with turning
180 concubines into soldiers as Sun Tzu apparently
was). There is, however, something inherently pleasing
about comparing the rules of ancient warfare with the
challenges of our own lives, businesses and careers.
If you can take a concept from a popular but unrelated
field (for example, television or sport or a phenomenon
from the natural world) and apply it to a trend you
want to talk about, you can often imprint your thinking
indelibly on other people’s brains.
At The ResuIts Consultancy, we show two slides in a
workshop about building a network: one is a picture
of a frog; the other a picture of a bat. We are making a
simple point: some people are reactive and laze around
in their ponds all day waiting for a juicy fly to drop in on
them. Others are more proactive, make a point of getting
out, covering the territory and seeking out their prey.
Which are you, I ask the audience, frog or bat?
It’s not a particularly startling analogy, but it never fails to
generate a buzz of excited chatter in the room. And once,
years after my session, I saw one of the delegates again.
‘I remember you,’ she said. ‘You’re the frog and bat man!’
4
Summarise
Forcing people to focus is critical if interactions (be they
meetings or phone calls) are not to become mere talking
shops. Because the temptation to ramble or stray well
away from the point is irresistible for some participants,
you need to find a way to bring a meeting to order.
The well-judged summary is an excellent device for
doing this graciously: it demonstrates that you have
been listening, allows the possibility of clarification, and
permits you to stamp your authority on an interaction
even if you have not been doing most of the talking.
One of our interviewees remembered his mentor fondly:
‘The great thing about Robert’s style of influence was that
it was so understated. He wouldn’t be the loudest voice
in meetings, or do most of the talking. But he would be
there guiding the outcomes in a very subtle way. He was
great at gently interrupting people who had been talking
too much by saying “John, let me just make sure I’ve
got the gist of what you’re saying… because I’m sure
that Alison has got something important to add to it…”
He was a great facilitator, not dominating a meeting with
ego but making sure everyone’s views were heard.’
Influence-building tactic:
Next time you want
to make a point or
an observation, particularly to a large audience, why
not consider expressing yourself metaphorically?
Influence-building tactic:
Maybe your organisation used to share the
properties of a lion, but now it needs to become
more of a cheetah: greater win ratios but smaller
prey. Or perhaps your team has become so
concerned with defending its territory that it has
stopped thinking about the need to score a few goals
of its own? Perhaps the cultural shift you are trying
to achieve is akin to a PC user encountering his
first Mac?
The more vivid your word picture, the more easily
your audience can relate to the original idea; and the
chances of your idea gaining traction and spreading
are increased exponentially.
Good nonconfrontational ways
of performing the vital public service of keeping a
discussion on track include saying the following:
• ‘Can we just take stock…?’
• ‘What we seem to be saying is…’
• Maybe it would helpful if I recap where we seem
to have got to so far…’
These can be particularly useful when a discussion
gets heated or when one or two participants are
dominating.
A good summary permits you to stamp
your authority on an interaction, even if you
have not been doing most of the talking.
WBD – May 2014 – Issue 23
5
Get feedback about process, not just
outcomes
Getting feedback is essential to the influential, but it
needs to be feedback about the right things.
Sports coaches often talk about looking at the process
rather than the outcomes: the fact that you did or did
not score a goal is only of fleeting interest to the coach.
Much more relevant is how the goal is scored – whether
the process can be broken down into constituent actions
that can each be individually analysed, practised and
potentially replicated in match conditions.
Dave Brailsford, the coach of the tremendously successful
British Olympic cycling team, attributes much of the
team’s success to the ‘aggregation of marginal gains’.
By breaking down each of the actions that contribute
to a successful cycling performance (even to the level
of considering the pillows the cyclists slept on during
preparation for a race), Brailsford was able to suggest
incremental improvements to each of those actions.
When aggregated, these made all the difference between
victory and defeat.
Summary
The conclusion I reached when I finished the book was
that there are many ways to achieve influence in an
organisation. It certainly isn’t the exclusive preserve of
extroverts and rainmakers. If you are keen to increase
your influence consider:
1. How can I leverage what I know – my expertise, my
intellectual capital?
2. How can I build out my network – how can I
strengthen my ties with influential people?
3. How well do I “play the game” – building alliances,
gathering support, understanding other peoples’
wants and needs?
In the aftermath of
a meeting or pitch,
we will often make a sweeping value judgement:
it went well; it was a disaster. But how often will
we anatomise victory or defeat – actually strive to
understand what specific behaviours or processes
made the difference between the one and the other?
Influence-building tactic:
The great sports stars and their coaches have this
down pat: improvement does not come from good
intentions or wishful thinking. It comes from the
almost scientific application of data driven feedback.
Secrets of Influential
People by Steven Pearce
is published on 27
June 2014 by Hodder &
Stoughton. It is available
for pre-order at Amazon
now. Steven has also
developed a one day
master class to help
professionals build
greater influence at
work. Contact
The Results Consultancy
for more details.
Winning Business Digest
has been written Steven Pearce
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